Thank God It's Toby: Highlights

The themes of my poetry include mental illness, obsession, abusive and difficult relationships, religious doubts/fears/phobias, queer romance, depression, and self-hatred. There are also heavy notes of loneliness, desperate decisions, regrets, and the pain of getting older and being nothing like what you expected.

In terms of style, I have emulated and tried to perfect the natural speech rhythm and form long sought after by Jack Kerouac. I believe in the use of poor grammar and colloquial phrases—as well as phonetic spelling to capture what I truly want each poem to be, and that is a true, honest translating of free thought and stream of consciousness into a work of beauty. I think if I want the emotion to be raw and real—I have to say it is just the way I would speak it if I was giving these words to friends, or my therapist, or family out loud. I want people to see my voice on the page, to know what I am handing them in the form of a poem is just as fluid and in the moment and heated up with passion and language as what I would give them if they asked me the question right at that moment.

I also, as a long admire of her work, have approached my poems from a place of brutal and unflinching honesty in much the same nature as Sylvia Plath. I’ve adopted a love of the em-dash in the following of Emily Dickinson. I do believe that something ugly—death, hatred, obsession—these things can still be kept as ugly and be mesmerizing, beautiful, comforting in their ugliness. What I’ve always admired most about Sylvia Plath and Emily Dickinson is they were not afraid to get visceral with their imagery, were not afraid to talk about the taboo, the personal, the intimate—the things that haunted them in everyday life; when I read their poetry I sense their vulnerability—but also their tremendous respect for their readers—their belief that we could handle these terrible truths and maybe, in fact, wanted them to acknowledge by someone outside of ourselves. I hope to offer that or something similar to the people who read my collection, “I Have Things to Say.”  

My style is confessional—but also universal. I want my message to resonate with more than just me—as I state in one of the poems within the collection—I aim to find people like me out there. 

I prefer a good free form poem—and that is what I tend to write—free form. It isn’t that I don’t put meter and rhyme and a lot of thought into the construction of my poems—its more that I want the meter, rhyme, and structure of my poetry to change according to the nature of each particular poem and when I am building and crafting each poem, I do use similar tools in all of them, but they are all unique—all something that can stand on their own.

I also seek to have a musicality to my poetry—as if you could speak against the right background music. Music is what got me into poetry in the first place—I mean really, some of the best poetry in the modern age comes from rock, indie, and alternative albums. I think that shines through in my work, that I love those musical artists—Phoebe Bridgers, Misaki, Bright Eyes, and so many others like them. I think their influence resonates through my poetry—I certainly see myself in their music. I can only hope someday to repay the favour with my words.

Highlights from Toby's Friday afternoon show on Shout Radio. Featuring chat with top showbiz guests.